Author Archives: Ryan Clark

About Ryan Clark

I'm the CEO of Linkbuildr Marketing and the brains behind our branding and blog content. I specialize in effective marketing strategies for hotels, luxury brands and real estate. If your brand is in need of a boost then don't hesitate to contact me for a free proposal. Follow me on Google+: +Ryan Clark Twitter: @Linkbuildr on Twitter. You can also come ask me a question on our Facebook Page.  

Foursquare Space Station Check In = Linkbait!

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October 23  |  Brand Building  |   Ryan Clark

The first Foursquare check-in from space was completed by astronaut Douglas Wheelock just the other day. In a world of PR and viral marketing it has become quite a bit harder to get heard, so when you can blast a message from space you know the world will tune in. While Foursquare battles the location based check-in war, it seems they just got a massive PR spike thanks to this interesting event. Gizmodo broke the news for most and it has struck up enough interest to really make me step back and analyze this whole event from a marketing perspective.

I really think this will help out Foursquare more than anything, but NASA surely doesn’t mind the extra buzz since they’ve been trying to capture the attention of the nation. I imagine it will be a while before we see another check in from space, but I am quite excited for the first Moon check-in, and then eventually other planets like Mars!

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Tequila Avion Brand Update

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October 21  |  Brand Building  |   Ryan Clark

I just thought I’d check up and see what has been going on with Tequila Avion since I last blogged about the sheer marketing genius going on. The Tequila has been mentioned on just about every celebrity blog, across multiple Tequila only websites as well as a plethora of high quality blogs. Their social media presence hit the ground running, and they’re still in the lead. I mentioned in my last post that it would take a while to crack the top 10 for the keyword Tequila, but it seems that things are looking brilliant for the company.

This marketing strategy has propelled them to spot #39 for the keyword Tequila ( according to Scroogle ), but I imagine you might see different results depending on where you live. I mentioned in my previous post that I didn’t expect them to get there that quick, and with more and more people talking about it, they should see some more movement. Keep in mind they’ve been doing a great job when they launch in a new city which alone nets them Liquor store links, as well a ton of local Twitter mentions. You can see there latest launch in Texas got some attention from the greatest Tequila blogs, and with flying sky banners you can’t go wrong.

I didn’t plan on an update this early so it will be really interesting to see how things continue on now until the end of the next season. I have no idea how hard they’re going to push Avion again, but I imagine it will be dominant throughout the season. I’d love to hear what you guys think about their marketing tactics, and what outcome you think might unfold.

 

 

Read the original post: http://www.linkbuildr.com/tequila-avion-entourage-big-brand-linkbait/

 

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Yahoo Directory UK/IE Shutting Down

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October 19  |  Link Directories  |   Ryan Clark

Yahoo recently announced that the UK/IE section of their directory will be closing down come November 18th, 2010. While this directory has been going strong for a decade, Yahoo has given you users options. You can now handle submissions to the UK/IE section that is under the main Yahoo directory. While it should be linked off the main site, you’ll have to dig a little deeper to find the announcement.

You may continue to maintain your listing through the US based Directory Submit program. Your site will remain listed in the Directory as it is now, and the applicable annual fee will apply on your anniversary date. No further action on your behalf would be required.

I’m not sure if we’ll see further closures within the Yahoo Directory regions, or if this is a sign of the whole thing slowing down. While I don’t think these directories pass anywhere near the same amount of link juice as they once did, I’d still want to be linked under my region from a domain like this. DMOZ is still worth it if you can somehow get a link, but you pretty much need a magical wand to make that happen. If you want to get in on the discussion, you can find us in this Webmaster World thread.

Small Business Branding With Kevin Spidel

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October 18  |  Brand Building  |   Ryan Clark

Here’s a wicked 45 minute lecture on small business branding during the 2010 CenPhoCamp conference which was held in downtown Phoenix. Kevin Spidel does a great job covering what’s hot and not, as well how do build your small business in these tough times. Everyone here at Linkbuildr has built this company from the ground up and love to share information. This is the kind of lectures I wish I could get out and do, so for now I’ll stick to the awesome people out there doing it large. Kevin Spidel should be a known name to most of you marketers, but if not check out his bio and see the amazing work he’s been involved in.

Press Release Link Building Strategies For 2010

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October 2  |  Link Building  |   Ryan Clark

With the Holiday season upon us, companies vamping up their marketing efforts, it’s time to rethink your press release strategy. Our company does a lot of PR for people not only for links, in fact usually they’re not first in mind, but to build the overall brand through exposure.

There’s nothing wrong or negative about the usual process, I just like to do things a little bit different..a little more ninja like. We can definitely get more out of the resources available to we the people, you just have to dig a little deeper.

As of late, Google has really been putting emphasis on building your brand. This could be through social media, the links you build and other citations. This is good news for companies and brands because this adds more fuel to the fire.

Social media is also an important aspect of a typical PR these days, so this can be used to your advantage. How many social media sites pick up these news stories? I can tell you now, getting a extra link or two from the likes of Squidoo, Topix.net and others isn’t too difficult.

One last thing before we get into it. I know that the search engines are not giving amazing link juice from each news site, on the same topic. So throw out any thoughts of targeted anchor text in your release. For one, it looks cleaner, and secondly, you’re putting these efforts towards your brand/site overall. You can obviously used targeted anchor text, I would however leave PR power to go towards just building up the root domain.

Part 1: Mixing up the sites you use to send a PR

There are many press release sites to choose from, and picking the right one will make the difference. The first advice I like to give clients is to utilize different PR sites for your news. You might as well spread it out and get some nice and easy links from their homepage. PRWeb releases tend to stay indexed easily, as well rank quite easily for long tail terms.

I’m going to list 5 PR sites I like to use, as well the ones I think that have retained the most link authority and brand status. These sites usually don’t push junk news, so you can rest assured you’re not getting garbage.

PRWeb.com – We’ll start with the biggest, most networked and one of the most trusted news distribution services around today. PRWeb combines their large news network with not only newsrooms, but blog sources as well as its social media connections. Prices range from $150 USD up to $350 and beyond.

24-7pressrelease.com – These folks are another big player and they have a couple good things going on. First, their network is quite large and has a lot of top niches in its arsenal. The prices for a PR here are really affordable, and if the second point is that they have a company/business directory. That directoriy itself has held up its quality and is well worth the review process.

MarketWire.com – Another large PR network that has a huge business network. I’ve had a lot of success releasing normal PR’s for my clients, and personally. You can see a list of each indsutry contact resource beforehand, so this feature plays into the next section for this post.

URLWire.com – All you SEO consultants are most likely well awre of Eric Ward’s news wire. It’s highly recommended by me, not because I’m brown nosing, but due to Eric’s style. Again, this isn’t a place you can go to submit junk news and expect the world. URLWire works to network your news with the most related sites in your industry. Release prices start at around $500 USD and I’ve seen some of the most successful news campaigns launched from here.

PR.com – Another PR service you are most likely familiar with. This news network also boasts a lot of connections within its distribution network. PR.com also happens to have their own business/company directory in which you ca get into.

Part 2: Press Release Link Analysis

Link analysis on a press release you say? Hell yea and why not?! Before picking any service I highly recommend you start snooping on the competition. Open up the link builders beloved Excel and start off a spreadsheet for me. Next, hit up the 5 press release sites linked above and try and find your competitors releases. If you cannot find any, take a look at what other companies are doing PR’s within your industry.

Ok, so now what? When you find a press release or two within your niche, turn on SEO Quake, Open Site Explorer, Majestic SEO or any backlink analyzer that does individual pages. All I ask you to do is see which news releases got picked up where. This will give you an idea of what to expect from your news. Obviously this isn’t fool proof, but I like a little more tactical application in my process.

Next, go back to news that’s 6 months or older and do the same thing. I’d take account of which PR sites do better at keeping that release indexed. As well, see if that release is ranking well for any long tail keywords associated.

This ain’t rocket science, but it is a little link science I guess. Even though I wasn’t a boy scout, they’re slogan certainly applies nicely to this industry. Just remember to look at the tags used and make sure those are on your list. That should help you target the news sites looking for your content.

Part 3: Build Links to Your PR

Some releases you put out are going to fall flat, sorry to say. Even with careful planning there are certain aspects that are just out of anyone’s control.

If you already have a network of blogs, social media profiles and other websites then you can do your part. Linking back to your news release from these areas is relevant, and will help keep that news alive and kicking.

Some companies even have a newsroom on their site, and from what I’ve seen it doesn’t cost you any dupe problems and helps keep things indexed. It’s all relevant to your company, so there is nothing black/grey hat going on here.

Final Thoughts:

While you’ll not notice a huge amount of traction from your first optimized release, keep at it, mixing things up. After half, or even a full year you’ll have a great diverse link set from all sorts of news sites.

I’d also keep in mind that these releases are spread across so many different sites. Google is obviously not giving “max link juice” through heavily syndicated content. Then again, prove me wrong by keeping meticulous statistics and track the movement yourself.

I hope this inspires businesses to take their PR campaigns to a new level. Let me know if anyone else out there has been implementing something similar, and if it is working for you.

Google’s Getting Scared Of Bing?

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September 25  |  News  |   Ryan Clark

In a recent interview I caught on Business Insider with Google’s Eric Schmidt talking about what he see’s as the Biggest threat to Google’s market share. With the partnership Bing has setup with Facebook, I’d be worried too. Top that all off with the recent Mayday updates and I see a wounded Google who finally may have someone to fight with…and that’s a good thing! I really don’t like having my eggs, or my clients, all in one basket so look forward to garnering more traffic from the Bing/Facebook side, especially those who got “raped” last May.

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Facebook Places Launch Video

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September 17  |  Social Media Sites  |   Ryan Clark

We all knew it was coming! Facebook Places is taking aim at Foursquare (and the other guys) with its new feature that is not at all original, but they have the user base so might as well. Of all the location based applications, this one will most likely give the Foursquare crew a run for its money depending on what else they do with it. One extra, cooler, better, faster, hard stronger ( sorry Daft Punk ) feature should be enough to leverage a lot of usage from the Facebook mob. For now I find myself not overly excited about this feature yet, and since I keep my Facebook profile on lock down, I don’t think I’ll use it much anywho. I do see the need for crucial integration of this feature into Facebook Pages though, and hopefully this helps brands and companies target their customers even more. Regardless, here’s a promo video that hypes it up a little more despite how lame it was done…all that money and this is the kind of production you put forth? LOLZ.

 

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Tequila Avion + Entourage = Big Brand Linkbait

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September 16  |  Brand Building  |   Ryan Clark

I end up watching a few shows here and there in my downtime and always enjoy Entourage for its blatant but workable product plugs. There has been a lot of talk lately about building brand links, and I thought we could dig a little deeper into that using the show. If you’ve been following the latest season, Turtle has been trying to make his next business venture with Tequila Avion. It’s a new luxury brand on the market, and has been a heavy set feature of the entire season. I took a look at the company after watching the final season and learned that it’s still in its infancy which makes it a great case study waiting to happen. Apparently, the owners are friends with show producer Doug Ellin and didn’t have to pay a dime for any marketing…makes you rethink your social networking tactics eh?

Avion Tequila LLC was formed by a group of entrepreneurs and beverage industry professionals with the sole purpose of creating and developing a tequila that defines a new standard of quality and taste. The announcement was made by Ken Austin, Founder and Chairman of Tequila Avion.

A Brand Going Viral

Breaking into the Tequila market won’t be an easy task, but done right the Avion investors should be sitting pretty. Since they’re a company with a virgin backlink profile, and a viral snowball effect that is currently hurtling towards success, I’d keep my eye on them as a shining example. Companies in the position to utilize these types of marketing channels will win big online without having to steer down a blackhat path.

If you have SEOQuake installed, load it up and take a quick look at the natural links obtained from the whole process. If you take a look at Google Blog search you’ll also see tons of sites spreading the good word. So you know that most backlink tools haven’t even caught up with the viral link effect, and I’m quite excited to check back in a month from now to see how the growth is going…so nerdy and sad, I know. No wonder my friends say I need to get out more.

Of course you’ll find this social media savvy company on Twitter and is doing a good job growing the brand from there. While everyone tends to want followed anchor text friendly links these days, they’re not all the rage anymore. URL shortening and social media networks have proven that there is more than one type of link on the block. Do a search at any given minute and you’ll see fans of the show and brand tweeting about where they got the product, that they’re drinking it now and uploading tons of their own media. You really cannot ask for a more when it comes to marketing these days. We’ll see if I’m right, and we’ll put Google Trends on my side as well..just to make me feel better.

Since blogging, social networks and apps you can bet that Avion will be featured on just about every luxury, drink, food and celebrity blog. So how is this going to really make a dent within say, the Google organic results? Well first of all, their brand name has their target keyword in the name. So this means the domain, and on-page SEO will pretty much take care of itself. There will be no need for a company like this to need targeted anchor text links…but don’t get me wrong, those links wouldn’t hurt either. As it currently stands, Tequila Avion isn’t ranking well at all for the keyword Tequila, but it’s really too early to tell. I imagine with the final season of Entourage the company will enjoy enough of a push to obtain a strong enough link profile to rank.

I’ll do my best to make the time to bring you more unique brands taking advantage of what’s going on right now in marketing. I still see so much cheesy, lame and downright terrible marketing efforts taking place these days..it’s sad really. I’ll also do my best to update this post later on, so if you see my slacking don’t hesitate to get in touch with me or send me a menacing tweet.

Read a follow up to their marketing: http://www.linkbuildr.com/tequila-avion-brand-update/

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